The Skywalkers: A Thriller (A Rossler Foundation Mystery Book 5)

by JC Ryan

  "Yeah, it looks like it does. Wow, I've never seen anything about the Eighth cycle."

  Now Matthews was unable to control his voice, which came out harsher than he intended. "Well, what are you waiting for? Tell me what it means, man!"

  "It looks like it's just pointing to other reference points where information about the other cycles. Raj would know more about that than I do."

  "Then we must get Raj here, at once."

  Matthews' urgent call to Raj summoned the data specialist to his office within a few moments. As soon as the translator had given Raj the coordinates within the index, he was able to sign up to his intranet account and pull up his records from Matthews' workstation. It was the work of only a few moments to begin scrolling the text from the Eighth Cycle references. Both Matthews and Raj waited tensely while the translator read off the gist of what they'd found. And then, Raj ran for Daniel's office.

  "Daniel," he cried, skidding into the inner sanctum like a kid on a pair of those old-fashioned shoes with tiny rollers in the soles. He was moving so fast that if he hadn't steadied himself by swinging around the doorframe with one hand, he'd have careened into the opposite wall.

  Daniel looked up, startled and then alarmed at the expression on Raj's face.

  "Raj, what the hell?"

  "Eighth Cycle. Daniel, we've found the Eighth Cycle!" He had no more breath to explain his meaning, but Daniel caught on.

  "Tenth Cycle records about the Eighth Cycle civilization? Is that what you've found?" He got out of his chair and rounded the desk to pound Raj on the back, unwittingly hampering the other man's ability to catch his breath. Raj nodded, unable to speak because Daniel was knocking the breath out of him every time he caught one.

  Daniel stopped pounding Raj on the back and stood straight, wearing his astonishment in the lines of his open mouth and widened eyes. "Raj, do you know what this means?"

  Raj nodded again, then shook his head no. He thought he knew what it meant, but wanted Daniel to articulate it.

  "If they have records of the Eighth Cycle, they may have them for all the others. We'll have historians and archaeologists begging for access! Who knows what we may learn that has been forgotten in the depths of time?"

  That was pretty much what Raj was thinking. And if that was the case, he was going to need several more assistants.

  ***

  Within days, news of the discovery had been reported to the board and selected universities. Matthews, of course, reported it directly to his employer, John Brideaux. True to his previous generosity to the Foundation, Brideaux called Daniel to offer to support the research for up to six months.

  The Foundation offices took on a new buzz. In-house translators worked on assignments chasing down references to Ninth or Eighth Cycles, now that they knew where to look for them. Researchers went to work scanning newly-translated texts for anything that would benefit the current, or Eleventh Cycle, civilization. Sarah had a small group specifically looking for anything that would help calculate how many years had passed in the Eleventh Cycle, her eye as always on the approach of the end of the cycle and how a civilization-destroying cataclysm might be avoided.

  With all this activity, it wasn't surprising that it took only a matter of a few weeks for the next bombshell to be discovered in the texts.

  No one could have predicted what it was, but the Rosslers were in a perfect position to find it plausible when it was found.

  Chapter 7 - A short secret expedition

  "JR, how do you feel about another archaeological expedition?" Daniel dropped the question into a lull in conversation in the canteen, where he, his brother, and a few of the close friends that formed the core of the Foundation were having a coffee break, along with Stephen Matthews.

  "Sign me up! Where to this time? The Himalayas? The Amazon jungle?"

  "Not such an exotic location, I'm afraid. Stephen here has found a reference to coordinates where a hardened facility from the Eighth Cycle was concealed within a geological feature right here in North America."

  "No kidding! Where?"

  "Seems to be in one of the side canyons branching off from the Grand Canyon."

  JR's countenance fell. "Man, we can't mount an expedition in there. It's a National Park."

  "No, it's all arranged. We have the financial backing from an old friend of the Foundation, John Brideaux. He’s sponsoring Stephen’s research here and now he’s also used his influence to get you into the Park with permissions we normally couldn’t get.”

  “This will be just you and Robert, as far as anyone knows, two buddies having a bit of a vacation backpacking in the canyon. We've secured special permits for you. You guys go for a couple of weeks, check it out, and report back. If you find anything, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. "

  "That's a lot of ground to cover in two weeks," JR objected.

  "Oh, didn't I say? We have specific coordinates, thanks to the work Summers did to translate Tenth Cycle references back in the day. You'll start by dropping into the canyon with one of the mule tours, but instead of accompanying them back up, you'll be on foot for the rest. You'll follow a map we've had made to a side canyon just a few miles upstream, but after that you'll have to keep your eyes open. Chances are the entrance is high on the canyon walls, after so long."

  "Hey, that actually sounds like fun," JR remarked.

  Salome spoke up. "Chances are there's nothing left. I mean, look at the ruins in the desert southwest, like Mesa Verde. Only about 1,500 years old and crumbling when they were found. We're talking fifty to seventy-five thousand years for this facility. It would be a miracle if you found anything at all, much less anything major."

  "Salome's right. This is precautionary only. After some of what's happened in the past few years, we're a little smarter and a little more cautious with information like this."

  "I suppose you've already checked with my wife."

  "Yes. She's attending a medical conference next week, says it's the ideal time for you to go have some fun."

  "I guess I will, then." JR grinned, his boyish good looks somehow the perfect complement to his freakishly tall frame. "When can I tell Robert?"

  "Come back to my office with me, and we'll tell him together. Stephen please join us, we could use your input in the planning."

  ***

  When Robert arrived, he found Daniel, JR and someone he’d seen around the halls lately but hadn’t yet met already convened. The first thing Daniel did was introduce him to Stephen Matthews. Then he explained the reconnaissance mission they were asking him to undertake with JR.

  JR didn’t at all object to the outing. In fact, he thought it would be fun. He did have one question, though. “How the heck could a big archaeological site, or even a small one, have escaped notice in the Grand Canyon? Wasn't every inch of it explored and mapped already?”

  “Well Dr. Matthews here found some controversy. It seemed someone had reported that the Smithsonian was concealing the existence of ancient relics found in the Grand Canyon, and there was an Egyptian connection.” Daniel’s explanation was as puzzling as it was surprising.

  Robert countered, “Let me see if I understand this correctly. The Tenth Cycle library came from the Great Pyramid of Giza, and now there was at least some evidence that maybe Eighth Cycle people had left something similar in the Grand Canyon?”

  Matthews handed him a printout of an old article. “Read it when you have time, but in summary what it says is some miner, back in the early nineteen-hundreds, found what looked like hieroglyphics, and a big city or something, down one of the side canyons. Here's the weird part, though. It looks like the whole thing was covered up by the Smithsonian, and the area is off limits now. I am still wondering why they'd do that."

  JR, not to be outdone, chimed in with his two cents. “If this were true, then several generations of archaeologists have been denied the opportunity to study what could have been the key to some of the mysteries of North American archaeology all along. Eg
yptian visitors over 5,000 years ago? Or an ignorant man, stumbling on an Eighth Cycle city and mistaking it for Egyptian?” For the normally genial and joking JR, this was a scandal, and he let the others know it.

  But Daniel had what he thought was the explanation. "Rumors of concealed finds being secreted in the Smithsonian's maze of underground storage rooms have been rife for years. Lots of people, Raj included, believe them. Somehow, the stories have always been passed off as hoaxes, and the Smithsonian has never been called to account for them.”

  Matthews added, "Well here's the thing, there were supposedly artifacts taken out of the site and stored at the Smithsonian. I wonder what the chances are that we could somehow manage to have a look at them. The connection between the Egyptian link to the Tenth Cycle and this is too much of a coincidence for me. The guy who discovered this thought it meant Egyptians had visited North America. I'm wondering if it wasn't Egyptians at all, but Eighth Cyclers."

  JR agreed, saying, “Well there’s one thing I have come to accept since I started working for the Rossler Foundation. Nothing is too weird to be true and I wouldn’t be surprised to learn there are more secrets in the dusty basements of the Smithsonian than anyone realized. We all know how inconvenient information about the more secret of the holdings could be buried and marginalized as conspiracy nut hoaxes.”

  “There seemed to be consensus, then.” Daniel interrupted the speculation and said, “Ok enough of that. We have an expedition to plan and launch.”

  Chapter 8 - Tent, campfire cooking kit

  On the Wednesday morning before JR and Robert were to set off on their trek, Daniel glanced at his Director of Security and gestured for her to come in and sit down. She closed the door behind her and did as he indicated.

  "Roy and I want to go on a little trip. Just a getaway. We're thinking about a week. With JR and Robert off exploring, it seems to me that this is the best time for me to be gone. After they get back, assuming they find something, all hell's going to break loose, and I don't know when I'll be able to get away. Sorry for the short notice, but will it be ok if we take off next week?"

  "That makes sense," Daniel said. "But, shouldn't you have a deputy in place before you take time off? Have you hired a second in command yet?"

  "No. I've been looking. I was wondering if you could persuade Sally Clarke to let Luke come watch the store for a week."

  "Oooh, you want me to live dangerously, is that it?" Daniel laughed. "I'll get Sarah to ask. If worst comes to worst, maybe we can pull in Sam Lewis for a week, if we can find him. Last I knew, he was fishing in the Catskills."

  "There's a thought. Is there time? I'd really like to leave Saturday morning, if you can spare me."

  "I'll work it out. You and Roy go have fun. Sarah and I will hold down the fort until everyone's back."

  "Thanks, Daniel. This means a lot to me."

  "Don't mention it. You and Roy haven't taken any time off since you got back from your honeymoon. High time you used some of that accrued leave."

  After Salome left, Daniel sighed. A little more notice would have gone a long way, but he was glad that Roy and Salome were going to get a break. They'd both been working too hard for too long. One of these days he was going to have to surprise Sarah with a vacation. He'd use the excuse of finding out if Sally was up for some babysitting when he called to suggest that Luke come in for a week to take over Salome's duties. He had no doubt that Luke would love it. It was Sally that he and Luke both feared. Daniel laughed, startling a passerby. Sally was all of five-foot-three, a fearsome monster if there ever was one. Images of her sweet face while reading little Nick to sleep replaced those of Luke, who always feigned terror when he talked about Sally bullying him. Daniel couldn't help but roar with laughter again.

  ***

  As usual, Roy had been absorbed by his project, supremely unaware that Salome at least couldn't just up and go off on a vacation. Salome was certain the thought never occurred to him. In fact, he probably shouldn't have done it without advance notice either, but as the star researcher on staff, he'd get away with just about anything he took into his head to do.

  Salome walked over to Roy’s office and gave him the news that their vacation had been approved.

  "Oh." Roy blinked. "Thank you for handling that."

  "You're welcome. You promised to make a list of what we needed to buy. Have you done that?"

  "Oh, yes, let me see, where did I put it?" Roy pawed among the mess of papers on his desk, before patting his pockets and coming up with a folded piece of paper and handing it to Salome.

  "Tent, campfire cooking kit...Roy, I've never cooked on a campfire."

  "Oh, then, uh, maybe we'd better get a kerosene stove instead."

  "Okay. Let's see, sleeping bags, kerosene lantern..." Salome's voice trailed off as she read the list. But when she looked at her husband's happy expression, she decided it would all be worth it, and maybe it would be fun.

  Salome got on the phone to locate a rental SUV, and by noon on Saturday, they had stuffed everything into it and were on their way north, up I25 toward Bighorn National Forest in northern Wyoming. From there, Roy had traced the most efficient route he could through promising areas in Montana and Idaho. He'd used both mountains and forested areas as his criteria. The week would be spent mostly in driving and quick reconnoiters with satellite images and topographical maps to guide them into public lands.

  Technically speaking, they would be trespassing, but the areas were so remote that Salome didn't think there'd be a problem. Only when it came to proposing a large compound where the Rossler Foundation could burrow in and hide would that become an issue. And if it came to that, Salome didn't want their whereabouts to be broadcast through public records. Or private ones for that matter.

  Like the secretive separatist organizations that occasionally fell afoul of the ATF department, they'd be outlaws. But if it came to that, the government would be the bad guys this time. Salome had every confidence that the Rossler Foundation needed this backup plan, but getting it approved by a small, core group without alerting the board and government agencies from the national to the local was going to be tricky. She was going to look like a conspiracy nut, like Raj, but the safety net would be worth it. At least Raj would be on her side.

  "Roy, did you say anything to Raj about what we're doing?"

  "No, should I have?"

  "No, just wondering. I know he and Sushma have a hideaway of sorts somewhere in Nevada. Have you ever talked to him about that?"

  "Not really. Just what to have if you want to disappear for a few weeks."

  "Hmm. And what if you wanted to disappear for a few years? If my doomsday scenario ever happens, God forbid, we will need a hideaway for quite a few years if not longer."

  Chapter 9 - Eligo Rarus

  They called themselves Eligo Rarus, which means ‘selected few', but of course they'd elected themselves to the designation. It came out of the rumored Billionaires' Club of the early years of the century. When the bottom dropped out of the economy in the first decade, about one percent of entrepreneurs somehow ended up with all the money, leading to a backlash against 'one-percenters'. Eligo Rarus was formed from the top one percent of them, maybe a dozen or so to begin with. Attrition had brought them down to six, who were obscenely rich on a scale that even the rest of the obscenely rich couldn't begin to imagine.

  They met via private satellite secure link every two weeks to discuss world events and take actions in their mutual interest. And they had an agenda.

  For as long as the group existed, these six had been accumulating shares in key industries such as communications, transport, banking, pharmaceutical, medical, technology and other key industries worldwide. They were shrewd enough to hide what they were doing – very seldom would they buy controlling shares, and never in their personal names. Instead, the acquisitions were always through companies that owned companies that owned yet more companies - hiding themselves five, six or more levels away from the f
ront, the public eye and any security screens.

  By now, between them they owned stakes in or controlled pretty much everything that had an impact on human life on this planet including water. Through their holdings they controlled politics in every democracy in the world – they decided who gets elected and who not, they decided which companies were going down and which ones were making a profit. They could drop the share values of a company in a matter of minutes and then buy up what they wanted at rock bottom prices or just destroy the company because they did not like it.

  During the latest meeting, they talked about elections happening in the UK and, in a few months’ time, Germany. Already they had decided the outcome of the UK election. The Tories will be in, and Lady Spencer (distant family of the late princess Diana) will be the new prime minister. As for Germany, the front-runner was entirely unsuitable. Soon, embarrassing revelations about his infidelity would surface. When his campaign was already reeling, more rumors, this time regarding his father’s role during World War II and the family’s suspicious rise to wealth would deal the death blow. The preferred candidate, Uwe Meinhardt, would then sail into office on a backlash.

  Next they turned their attention to a new up and coming internet search engine. Already, it had cornered ten percent of the search market, in just the last six months. After making the decision whether to simply shut them down or to own them, the decision was to own them by funding the venture capital they sought. Afterward, Eligo Rarus would divert traffic to them from the existing search engines so they would become popular quickly. Once they were making money, an IPO would be proffered, so Eligo Rarus could step back and let other companies take up the shares, funding the company going forward. Obviously, their own hidden companies would own the control as always.

  The most interesting point of discussion was an update about the Eighth Cycle discovery by the Rossler Foundation. The Eligo Rarus had been keeping their eyes on the Foundation since it was formed a few years ago and considered it a prime target. When the time was right, they planned to move in and take over that Tenth Cycle Library, but for now they were happy to just observe and let others pay for it.